Malcolm took the helm, gave his orders and steered farther westward.
By this time the people on shore had caught sight of the cutter. They saw her come stealing out of the thin dark like a thought half thought, and go gliding along the shore like a sea-ghost over the dusky water, faint, uncertain, noiseless, glimmering. It could be no other than the Fisky! Both their lady and their friend Malcolm must be on board, they were certain, for how could the one of them come without the other? and doubtless the marchioness—whom they all remembered as a good-humored, handsome girl, ready to speak to any and everybody—would immediately deliver them from the hateful red-nosed ogre, her factor. Out at once they all set along the shore to greet her arrival, each running regardless of the rest, so that from the Seaton to the middle of the Boar's Tail there was a long, straggling, broken string of hurrying fisher-folk, men and women, old and young, followed by all the current children, tapering to one or two toddlers, who felt themselves neglected and wept their way along. The piper, too asthmatic to run, but not too asthmatic to walk and play his bagpipes, delighting the heart of Malcolm, who could not mistake the style, believed he brought up the rear, but was mistaken; for the very last came Mrs. Findlay and Lizzy, carrying between them their little deal kitchen-table for her ladyship to step out of the boat upon, and Lizzy's child fast asleep on the top of it.
The foremost ran and ran until they saw that the Fisky had chosen her lair, and was turning her bows to the shore, when they stopped and stood ready with greased planks and ropes to draw her up. In a few minutes the whole population was gathered, darkening, in the June midnight, the yellow sands between the tide and the dune. The Psyche was well manned now with a crew of six. On she came under full sail till within a few yards of the beach, when in one and the same moment every sheet was let go, and she swept softly up like a summer wave, and lay still on the shore. The butterfly was asleep. But ere she came to rest, the instant indeed that her canvas went fluttering away, thirty strong men had rushed into the water and laid hold of the now wingless Psyche. In a few minutes she was high and dry.
Malcolm leaped on the sand just as the Partaness came bustling up with her kitchen-table between her two hands like a tray. She set it down, and across it shook hands with him violently: then caught it up again, and deposited it firm on its four legs beneath the cutter's waist. "Noo, my leddy," said Meg, looking up at the marchioness, "set ye yer bit fut upo' my table, an' we'll think the mair o' 't efter whan we tak oor denner aff o' 't."
Florimel thanked her, stepped lightly upon it, and sprang to the sand, where she was received with words of welcome from many, and shouts which rendered them inaudible from the rest. The men, their bonnets in their hands, and the women curtseying, made a lane for her to pass through, while the young fellows would gladly have begged leave to carry her could they have extemporized any suitable sort of palanquin or triumphal litter.
Followed by Malcolm, she led the way over the Boar's Tail—nor would accept any help in climbing it—straight for the tunnel: Malcolm had never laid aside the key his father had given him to the private doors while he was yet a servant. They crossed by the embrasure of the brass swivel. That implement had now long been silent, but they had not gone many paces from the bottom of the dune when it went off with a roar. The shouts of the people drowned the startled cry with which Florimel turned to Malcolm, involuntarily mindful of old and for her better times. She had not looked for such a reception, and was both flattered and touched by it. For a brief space the spirit of her girlhood came back. Possibly, had she then understood that hope rather than faith or love was at the heart of their enthusiasm, that her tenants looked upon her as their savior from the factor, and sorely needed the exercise of her sovereignty, she might have better understood her position and her duty toward them.
Malcolm unlocked the door of the tunnel, and she entered, followed by Rose, who felt as if she were walking in a dream. But as he stepped in after them he was seized from behind and clasped close in an embrace he knew at once. "Daddy, daddy!" he said, and turning threw his arms round the piper.
"My poy! my poy! her nain son Malcolm!" said the old man in a whisper of intense satisfaction and suppression. "You'll must pe forgifing her for coming pack to you. She cannot help lofing you, and you must forget tat you are a Cam'ell."
Malcolm kissed his cheek, and said, also in a whisper, "My ain daddy! I hae a heap to tell ye, but I maun see my leddy hame first."
"Co, co, this moment co!" cried the old man, pushing him away. "To your tuties to my leddyship first, and then come to her old daddy."